Will consider closing certain US mosques: Donald Trump

Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump has said he would consider closing certain mosques in the US with radical leadership

Paris under attackUpdated: Nov 17, 2015 01:46 IST

AP

A file photo shows Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump speaking during a campaign in the US.(AP)

Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump has said he would consider closing certain mosques in the US with radical leadership because of the Paris attacks.

“I would hate to do it, but it’s something that you’re going to have to strongly consider,” Trump told MSNBC on Monday. He said the government should increase surveillance in and around mosques and Americans must reassess some of their civil liberties in this dangerous time.

“We have to be much tougher,” he said. “We are going to have to give up certain privileges that we’ve always had.”

Trump told a weekend rally that things would have turned out differently in Paris had the victims of the attacks been armed with guns. He repeated that assertion in the MSNBC phone interview.

“Had there been some guys with a gun, there would have been a shoot-out and probably the primary people that got whacked would have been the killers,” he said.

“Had there been other people carrying weapons, you would have had a lot different story, believe me.”

Trump criticized President Barack Obama for not moving earlier to destroy the Islamic State sites that France bombed over the weekend.

He said the US should be going more aggressively after the group’s oil and financing and pressing other countries to intensify their fighting against the radicals.